High speed digital printers are in common use today for many production processes ranging from printing of a single document to large scale production of multiple copies of documents. In a typical system, the document or image to be printed is represented by digital data. This data can be created either through scanning or digital generation of the document or the image via a computer. This data is typically supplied to a printer over a network connection. The data is then processed by a raster imaging processor (RIP) associated with the printer and converted to a format usable by the printer to recreate the image.
Historically, once a print job was sent to a printer, it had to run its course, resulting in the job going to completion even if errors were detected before the print was complete. Prior art printers included mechanisms by which an operator could cancel a print job, but typically these mechanisms require an unusually high degree of operator involvement in the print job. Thus, often print jobs had to be printed multiple times because of problems later found in the print job. This is especially troublesome in large print jobs with multiple copies of a document being printed, as the need to rerun the print job was expensive and wasteful.
Some of the newer printers allow for the generation of a proof set to allow the operator to check the print job before multiple copies are run. The printer receives a print job from the RIP and prints a proof set. The print job is then put into a hold queue while an operator reviews the proof set for accuracy before running the entire production run. Such proofing is an effective method for conserving resources and decreasing costs by avoiding the generation of multiple copies of a job with errors. If the operator uncovers errors in the proof set, then steps are taken to correct the errors before further expense or waste is incurred. At times, however, the correction of the errors is a very arduous and time consuming task. This is in large part due to a lack of information on the part of the operator. He often lacks sufficient information about the job to key back into the job and make appropriate corrections. As an example, if a page in the proof is not printing as expected or desired, it becomes necessary to ascertain what the features are that are associated with that page to determine why it printed the way it did. The features while known by the printer are not readily available to the printer operator. Historically, it requires the operator or the job requester to revisit the original generation of the job to determine the features. The effort to identify and correct problem can thus become a large task.
Thus, there remains a need for a system and method that eases the review of proof sets of print jobs and provides a basis for making any necessary adjustments.